Reflection and Introspection
by ThePandorica
Summary: "Yet here she was, plaguing his own thoughts and infecting his dreams like a virus, playing out the same old scene like a broken record." - MalCobb, Pre-Fischer Job.


**A/N:** A fanfic a day keeps the jetlag away! – Just come back from America, and I'm feeling a little drained. So, to counteract my jetlag and to stay awake I have decided to write some more fanfiction. This time, it's angsty!MalCobb showing Cobb's view on Mal in his virtual dream prison, as I felt they needed a little more love in the wonderful world of Inception. Enjoy!

-:-

_Mind over matter_

_Be it broken, bruised or battered_

_I'll keep coming like freight train_

_-__**Oliver Boyd and the Remembralls: Necessity (I'll be alright)**_

-:-

"You're late again baby,"

He looks up and sighs, running a weary hand through his sandy, damp hair before settling in the familiar seat across from her, striding over to it in a few menial bounds. It's a blue leather sofa, complete with cracks and grooves – worn from age and use. Mal is sitting across from him, with her head in her hands and is staring intently at him. A slight crease runs across her brow as her gaze locks with his. She's there, he thinks to himself as he meets her gaze. She's _always _there.

"I know, I know Mal," he responds tiredly, feeling himself sinking back into the same, familiar routine that his mind screams at him to break every time sinks into his own personal dream world: _her_ prison.

"Have you come to join me and the children?" she questions, stabbing an indignant finger at him. Her tone is filled with anger and he can't help but reel slightly. He never did like Mal when she was angry. Arthur would definitely agree with him on that front.

"Not today Mal," he says, trying to keep eye contact, already knowing what her reaction will be. And sure enough, a few seconds later, the sound of smashing glass sounds around the living room as she upends the table, as the glass vials and paperweights land on the wooden floor with a resounding crash.

"Why Dom? Don't you want to see James and Phillipa? They call for you, you know. They want you to come home,"

He stands up from the sofa. Tiredly, cautiously: as though his legs have turned to lead and he's worried what would happen if he were to move too quickly.

"They're not real, honey. None of this is, I keep telling you-"he responds, not wanting to turn around and back away just yet. He'd prefer to stay in the dream world for a few more minutes.

"But I wouldn't listen, right?" she interrupts, near yelling at him, her face now glistening with the tracks of fast fallen tears.

He pauses, thinking her reaction over in his shocked and numbed mind. _She was getting clever... _Pausing again, he decides to continue walking, this time tearing his gaze away from his wife and instead, directs it toward the elevator in front of him.

Even the prison he built was not enough to contain her. He should have really seen it coming, if he was honest with himself. Nothing had ever been enough to contain Mal, even when she had been alive. Of course, his mind (and she too, he supposes) had tricked him into thinking that he could best her. But could he really beat his own mind? Lock and secure down his own _memories_? No – obviously he couldn't. The answer had been staring him in the face for months or for whatever amount of time since they had exited limbo: since she had gone.

"Dom, look at me." Her voice cuts through his reverie like a knife, sugary sweet and inviting. For a minute, she sounds forgiving and he has to rapidly convince himself that none of this is real. She doesn't mean anything. _She_ isn't even supposed to exist anymore.

Turning away, he slowly heads toward the lift, his feet placing themselves on the ground, one tiny step at a time. She is just a shade, he thinks. She's just a part of his subconscious, a rogue part – she wasn't supposed to happen, but now he couldn't control it. He had lost control of her it seemed. …But here she was, plaguing his own thoughts and infecting his dreams like a virus, playing out the same old scene like a broken record.

What did she _want?_

"Why are you here Mal?" he bites out, hoping to gauge somewhat of a different reaction from his shade wife than he usually does. For a minute, he thinks that he can spot a glimmer of _something else_ in her eyes, before she strides up to him and kisses him full on the mouth.

He responds, warily but lovingly, dropping his guard for the briefest of moments to enjoy the kiss and pretend that it's his actual wife he's kissing, and not just some projection. But then, it ends and he's back to where he started again – grappling at loose threads with no clearer direction to finding an answer.

Before she can say one more word, he darts out from the room and into the elevator. Before she can yell for the children or curse his name, he turns away from her and clasps his hands over his ears, sinking into a crouch in the far corner as the elevator climbs steadily upward.

-:-

Cobb wakes up in what seems like a few seconds later, but in reality he knows that it's far more than that. Slowly, he slides off the lawn chair and pulls out the intravenous drip from his arm, trying not to shake more than he's allowing himself to. His face is damp with tears, he knows, and he tries to wipe them from his face with the back of his hand letting out a steady, slow breath as he does so.

It hurts, every time he goes down there, more than he could ever imagine. But he knows that even though Mal's only been gone two months, he has to keep gripping onto even that little piece of frayed reality, to keep track of his dreams.

Silently, he places the spinning top on the floor and spins it. Time seems to slow as the top goes around and around and around, until he's wondering whether Mal was right, until it eventually stops falling onto the floor with a small tap.

He lets out a breath he didn't even know he was holding, before continuing to pack up the equipment, and for a moment, he can't help but feel that he's faced one of his biggest demons – yet he knows that somewhere deep down, the real challenge has yet to come.

-:-

**Review? **


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